Until We Meet Again...
The silver lining in that behavior you repeat again and again
I feel like I’m being met with the same part of myself and asked to look at her again and again and again…
One of the women in a monthly Circle I host each month shared this sentiment with some frustration last night. Everyone nodded in agreement, echoing that they understood.
I felt it too.
That part of you… that pattern, that habit, that compulsion to engage, react, think, or behave in a certain way repeatedly. In a way that doesn’t feel it’s supporting or serving you. We look at it, we work on it, we think we’ve healed it.
And then, bam, it smacks us right down again.
Haven’t I spent enough time here? Haven’t I gotten the damn message?? we think to ourselves.
But there it is, staring you in the face. It can feel bullying or taunting.
Nah-nah-nah-nah-nah-nah! You can’t get me!
But here’s the thing— often times, when this recurrent theme creeps into your life again, it’s not indicative of failure. It’s not that you’ve been doing the work wrong.
We are cyclical beings. We heal in phases. When we work through something for the first time, we’re this one version of ourselves. We’re living life from a different perspective, perhaps even from a different set of values. What we were ready to see and process at that time is going to be different from what we’re ready to look at 6 months or 6 years later. So, we move through what we can until we feel we’re ready to move on.
We live life. We make choices. We make changes. We meet new people. We start new jobs. We grieve new losses. We celebrate new wins. We learn new things.
And as we’re doing all of this living, we’re uncovering parts of ourselves we’ve never been with before and in that way, we can become vulnerable.
Just as we’re beginning to feel strong, resilient, wise, and maybe even masterful…
There it is again.
That part of you that you thought you’d released. That recurring dream you thought you were done having. That behavior you thought you’d dropped for good.
It’s staring straight into your soul. It feels like it’s IN your soul. Maybe it hurts. Maybe it aches. Maybe it brings you to your knees and guts you with jagged sobs.
I thought I was past this.
You were. You’re not wrong there. That old version of you had moved past this to the capacity that she could. But she’s grown since then. She’s wiser. She’s more experienced. And she’s ready for a different layer of healing.
So you’re being faced with this pattern again, not because you didn’t really heal it last time around, but because you’re ready to let go of a different part of the story that built “this” into you. You’re ready to see or feel connections that you weren’t available for the last time this surfaced.
And so, down you go… into the depths of feeling, remembering, analyzing, processing, and shedding. It’s messy there… it’s hard to know what’s even happening sometimes. We can feel like we’re losing everything we’d worked so hard to become “good” at. We can feel like we’re losing our identity. Like we’re losing our stability. And in some ways and at some times, we truly are losing those things. But not because we’re regressing. Rather, we’re expanding. We’re growing our capacity. And that process is a cycle. It’s not an upwards trajectory. It’s a circle or a spiral. We climb up, up, up, and then we slide down. We rest there at the bottom for a while, wrestle with ourselves or maybe have a nice rest, and then up we go again. Voyaging on into the next season of our lives.
And the cycle begins again.
We live life. We make choices. We make changes. We meet new people. We start new jobs. We grieve new losses. We celebrate new wins. We learn new things. And as we’re doing all of this living, we’re uncovering parts of ourselves we’ve never been with before and in that way, we can become vulnerable yet again.
And there it is… another resurgence of that part of you that you thought you’d already healed.
Your soul knows your journey and your path. Your soul knows when it’s time… when you’re ready to shed the next layer, getting closer to your essence and your core. We often feel blindsided by the aggressive invitation we receive. We don’t feel ready to confront what we’re being called to come into relationship with, so we ignore it. When it doesn’t go away, we fight it. But eventually, we surrender.
We get into bed with it again. Have a roll around in the sheets. And this fills us with shame or guilt… it can feel like an admission of defeat. Like we’re cheating on our highest self with our dirty past.
But make no mistake… this surrender is a sign of strength. Stripping down and baring it all… being tender and exposed… it’s honest. It’s true. It’s sitting with yourself. It’s being naked and laying heart to heart with your greatest fears. And that is courageous as fuck.
You’ll see things from a different angle. You’ll find a connection you didn’t notice the last time. A new part of you will ache. A different part of you will feel longing. Part of you won’t want to let go now that you’re reunited with this memory. The comfort of this pattern’s familiarity or the surge of dopamine it creates.
But it’s just visiting until this layer is ready to be shed. It’s not here to stay. It’s here to be processed in a deeper way and to be used as a tool for your healing.
Your soul knows that. Your soul understands.
And so, as quickly as this part of your past swept you off your feet and carried you down into the trenches… it prepares to leave you.
This is the part where you may feel drawn to cling to it. To preserve any part of the memory that felt good. But you’ll eventually notice, it’s easier to let go than it is to hold on. You’ll remember what happened the last time you went through this… how you were able to live life more powerfully and with greater presence.
And so, you let your hands relax.
You loosen your grip.
You whisper, Thank you for teaching me.
And you walk up that spiral staircase.
Until we meet again.
